A Brief History of the Evolution of Shop LLAP
January 2010 -
Leonard was interested in having t-shirts made for his upcoming exhibition of his photography project, “Secret Selves,” at MASS MOcA. Naturally, he consulted his granddaughter Dani and asked for her input. Leonard was so impressed with her conceptions that he decided to hand the project over to Dani who, at the time, was working towards her degree in Merchandise Marketing.
March 2010 -
Leonard and Dani launched Secret Selves, a small shop on Etsy.com, which sold shirts relating to Leonard’s project.
During this time, Leonard created a Twitter account, @therealnimoy, to promote the shop, not knowing what a huge and fulfilling part of his life it would become. He began tweeting daily and fell in love with his newfound ability to communicate regularly and personally with his passionate fans. Leonard routinely ended each tweet with his signature “LLAP.”
September 2010 -
As @therealnimoy continued to gain thousands of followers daily, the acronym LLAP was also becoming popular across the Twitterverse. Thus, the LLAP shirt made its online debut to the Secret Selves shop. This is still their best seller to date.
June 2011 –
By this time, Leonard and Dani’s humble shop started to grow. They began selling additional merchandise, many of which were personalized items such as t-shirts featuring Leonard’s own hand in the Vulcan salute which he hand-traced himself using a fabric marker.
February 2012 -
Leonard and Dani graduated from Etsy.com and opened their own online store, now known as ShopLLAP.com.
February 2015 -
Leonard passed away on February 27th 2015 due to complications from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease AKA COPD.
Shop LLAP donates a percentage of their yearly profits to UCLA's COPD research team as a tribute in memory of Leonard Nimoy. Click here if you would like to make a separate donation.